Reel with spring thread

ABSTRACT

A REEL HAVING INNER AND OUTER TELESCOPING TUBULAR-FLANGED HUB PORTIONS PULLED TOWARD EACH OTHER BY A COILED SPRING ATTACHED TO ONE SIDE SECTION OF THE REEL AND FUNCTIONING LIKE A THREADED MEMBER BY ITS ENGAGEMENT WITH SPRING-ENGAGING MEANS ATTACHED TO THE OTHER HALF SECTION OF THE REEL.

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REEL WITH SPRING THREAD Joseph E. Moore, 1142 S. 16th St., Blair, Nebr. 68008 Filed: Aug. 28, 1972 Appl. No.: 284,395

Inventor:

US. Cl 242/118.4, 242/71.9, 242/73,

242/115, 242/116, 242/128, 242/129 Int. Cl B65h 75/14, B65h 49/00 Field of Search ..'242/118.4, 118.5, 118.6,

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 2 (as i sellso 82 Primary ExaminerGeorge F. Mautz Attorney, Agent, or Firm-Hiram A. Sturges A reel having inner and outer telescoping tubularflanged hub portions pulled toward each other by a coiled spring attached to one side section of the reel and functioning like a threaded member by its engagement with spring-engaging means attached to the other half section of the reel.

ABSTRACT 5 Claims, 3 Drawing Figures 368 H1919 Bass ..242 71.9

III III! |2o -J I32 lea 1 PATENIED AUG 2 0 I914 Ill/III I III IZOV 132 FIG] FIG?) REEL WITH SPRING THREAD FIELD OF THE INVENTION This invention is in the field of reelsupon which electrical wire can be stored.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PRIOR ART Coils of wire of the prior art are of a generally cylindrical shape on their outer periphery, having a cylindrical center opening, and with parallel ends. Such coils come in various thicknesses from end to end, therefore, an adjustable reel is desired for receiving such a coil. Such a reel must have a central opening for receiving an axle around which the wheel can turn as the wire is pulled off and in which the total width of the reel is adjustable to accommodate the width of the coil of wire to be received.

The present practice in the prior art is for a coil of wire, having no reel on it, to be delivered from the factory in a cardboard box. There is no reel in the cardboard box to protect the wire from coming out of its place in the coil in which it is delivered by damage occurring from blows against the cardboard box during shipping or working at construction sites where damage can easily occur.

In the present practice, wire is drawn from the coil in the box through a hole in the cardboard box.

However, when the box has been damaged, the coil will have changed its shape and the wire cannot be pulled out through the hole in the box since it can become tangled from the damage and lost its symmetrical coiled relationship leading to high labor costs in untangling wire and handling it.

A further disadvantage of the prior art has been the need to carry many boxes full of wire coils, both new and partially used, from one construction site to another, each box being lifted individually and carried individually without benefit of any mechanization.

It is, therefore, a further object to make it possible to achieve an end which would have been desirable in the prior art which is to be able to mount a coil of wire on a reel having an axial opening which can receive an axle so that the coil can be placed on a carrier containing multiple coils,.the carrier having wheels andbeing easy to move from construction site to construction site.

It may seem that this desirable end should be easily achieved, but first one must realize that these coils are already coiled and the problem is how to place an already coiled wire configuration onto a reel without going through the long, costly and tedious step of unwinding from the coil and winding onto the reel.

It is important that a reel for holding these wire coils do more than simply hold its end flanges in a fixed position. I have perceived that the end flanges must continually press against the sides of the coil. Without such pressing, as the wire is removed from a coil, the coil configuration becomes of smaller width along its axis of rotation and the fixed position end flanges cannot adjust to this change which would, therefore, result in a displacement of the wire from its ideal position in the coil and, therefore, entanglement of the wire leading to need for time-costly dlsentaglement.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION A reel having inner and outer telescoping tubular hub portions having lapping inner ends and each having a flange on its outer end transversely disposed to the direction of telescoping, the end flanges and their respective attached hub portions forming right and left basic reel sections, a coiled spring, means securing the coiled spring to one of the reel sections with the spring disposed partially on the inside of the innermost one of the hub portions and extending to a point of attachment to the basic reel section of the other of the two hub portions, a spring engaging means attached to the innr side of the inner one of the hub portions and lapping the spring and disposed between the coils of the spring whereby a rotation of the basic reel sections with respect to each other in one direction will cause a mated threadlike inter-relationship between the said spring and the spring-engaging means for causing the bias reel sections to be drawn toward each other during rotation with respect to each other in one direction and to move away from each other during rotation with respect to each other in an opposite direction.

The reel further having flanges made from thermoplastic material for economy of manufacture, but for strength, the thermo-plastic material being reinforced by ribs larger at the center and tapering toward the outer circumference of the reel, all formed of the same piece of the integral plastic material with the remainder of the respective flange, the hub portion attached to each respective flange likewise being formed of plastic and from the same piece of material as the respective flange for high production low-cost manufacture.

The hub portions each tapering to a narrower terminal end from larger portions adjacent the respective flange to which they are attached whereby the net effect of the overlapping hub portions is to provide an external composite surface for receiving wire thereagainst which is a surface as nearly cylindrical as is practically possible inasmuch as the interfitting of the hub portions telescopically is necessary.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING FIG. 1 is a sectional view taken along the line 1-1 of FIG. 3.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view taken along the line 2-2 of FIG. 1, but with the left-end flange removed.

FIG. 3 is a side elevation of the reel of this invention.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT In FIG. 1 the reel of this invention is generally indicated at 20 and has right and left end flanges generally indicated at 22 and 24, each having attached to its inner side a substantially cylindrical tubular hub portion 30 and 32 respectively, the hub portion 30 being outside the portion 32 and snugly and slidably receiving the latter therein.

Each tubular hub portion 30 and 32 projects toward the opposite one of the end flanges 22 or 24, and the end flanges 22 and 24 are disposed in parallelism for the most part.

Each end flange 22 or 24, with its hub portion 30 or 32 respectively form one of two basic reel sections 36 and 38 respectively.

The basic reel sections 36 and 36 form the equivalent of a drum of an ordinary reel, which latter would have a cylindrical drum surface.

The end flanges 22 and 24 are urged toward each other by a spring 50 which is a coiled spring having coils or convolutions shown at 52, 54, and 56 which are spaced apart along an axis 70 disposed at a right angle to the flanges 22 and 24 and centrally and axially of the cylindrical hub portions 30 and 32.

One end 58 of the spring 50 is suitably secured to the right section 36 by means of a metal plate 80 which is secured by rivets 82 to the right flange 22. The metal plate has a central opening 88 through which an axle,

not shown, can be disposed for arranging the reel for rotation thereabout during the paying out of wire stored on the reel, the wire not being shown.

The metal plate 80 is disposed on the outer side of the flange 22 and the right end convolution 58 of the spring 50 is welded thereto at 90.

The spring 50 extends to the left inside a portion of the left hub 32 and there a pair of spring-engaging members 90 and 92 lap opposite sides of the spring 50 between coils 52 and 54 thereof, as shown.

The right end flange 22 has a right end plate 120 attached thereto and formed of metal for strength and having an opening 132 on its inner side surrounding the axis 70 and for receiving an axle, not shown. The end plates 120 and 80 can be formed of any suitable material, metal not being vital, although it is a convenience that the end plate 80 be made of metal for the strength of the welding at 90.

The end plate 120 is likewise secured by rivets 122 to the flange 24'. The same rivets 122 attach the hub 32 to the flange 24 since the hub 32 has an outwardly extending portion 140 disposed in parallelism with the flange 24 through which the rivet 122 extends. The hub has an out-turned portion 142 held by the rivets 82 to the right flange 22.

The out-turned portions 140 and 142 preferably extend completely around the periphery of the respective hub portion.

Referring to FIG. 3, a sample end flange can there be seen. The end flange which is shown is the end flange 24, however, it will be understood that both end flanges are the same since they are both provided with thicker portions 220 closer to the axis 70, as best seen in H6. 1, whereas the end flanges each have outwardly extending ribs 230 peripherally extending outwardly from a thick central portion 220 of the end flange. The ribs 230 extend radially outward and are spaced apart. For example, there might be six ribs, as shown, which taper from thicker inner portions at 232 to thinner outer portions 234 when an end flange is looked at from its outer side, as seen in FIG. 3. Between the ribs or thicker portions 230, there are recesses 238 causing the thickness at these parts of an end flange to be lesser than at the ribs 230 to save plastic material, to provide excellent appearance, and to give good strength proportional to the weight of the reel. Weight which is lesser is of advantage both in handling and in shipping costs.

In operation, it will be seen that with the two basic reel sections 36 and 38 separated from one another completely, a coil of wire, not shown, of generally cylindrical shape and having an open center, can be placed on the right reel section 36 with the outer one of the hubs 30 thereby extending up through the central opening of the wire coil, not shown.

Thereafter, the left reel section can be placed so that its hub 32 is disposed inside'the hub 30. Then, a twisting of the left reel section 38 in one direction will cause a thread-like action, as above described, whereby the engagement of the spring-engaging members 90 and 92 with the spring 50 will cause the hub 32 to be drawn inwardly of the hub 30 which can be continued until the flanges 22 and 24 are in engagement with each other. Thereafter, still further rotation is continued so that a tension is placed on the spring by causing it to be somewhat extended so that the end flanges 22 and 24 tend to press very firmly against the sides of the coil so that as the coils of the wire coil, not shown, are drawn off of the reel, any collapsing of the sides of the wire coil, not shown, will be compensated for by a further inward movement of the flanges 22 and 24 under the influence of the spring 50.

As best seen in HO. 1, the hub 30 is cylindrical on its outer surface, whereas its inner surface tapers from an outer end nearest the attached flange which is thicker on all sides to an inner end which is thinner on all sides. Any cross-section of the hub 30 or hub 32 taken at a right angle to the axis shows the inner surface of each hub to be circular and also the outer surface of each hub to be circular.

The inside hub 32 has a thickness through its wall on any side which is greater adjacent its flange 24 than at its inner terminal end.

As thus described, the thickness of any side wall of each hub 30 and 32 tapers gradually from the outer end of the respective hub to the inner end.

The inner surface of any side of the outer hub 30 inclines slightly from being closer to the axis 70 at its outer end, adjacent its flange 22, to being disposed slightly farther from the axis 70 at its opposite or inner end.

The outer surface of the inner hub 32 inclines also with respect to the axis 70, being disposed farther from the axis 70 at the outer or flange 24 end of the inner hub 32 to the inner or opposite end of the hub 32.

The result of this construction is that the outer surface of the outer hub 30 is parallel to the axis 70, as is desired, and the offset inward from the outer surface of the outer hub 30 the outer surface of the inner hub 32 is lesser because of these taperings which permit the substantially cylindrical configuration of the inner surface of a coil of wire, not shown, to be received against the outer surfaces of the two hubs 30 and 32 with the least distortion of the coiled wire.

I claim:

1. A reel having inner and outer telescoping tubular hub portions having lapping inner ends, spaced right and left end flanges attached to outer ends of said hub portions respectively, said end flanges and their at-.

tached hub portions forming right and left basic reel sections, a coiled spring having spaced convolutions being attached to one of said basic reel sections and extending into the hub portion of the other basic reel section, spring-engaging means extending inwardly from the hub portion of the other basic reel section and lapping and extending between convolutions of said spring whereby as said reel sections are rotated with respect to each other the interaction of said spring-engaging means and said spring having an effect similar to mated threads that a rotation of said reel sections in one direction will cause said flanges to be drawn toward each other and the rotation of said reel sections in the opposite direction will cause said flanges to be urged apart.

2. The combination of claim 1 in which each of said hub portions has shoulder means extending outwardly therefrom, and securing means extending through said respective shoulder means and into the respective adja- 4. The reel of claim 1 in which said end flanges each have a'common axis about which their inner sides are generally disposed in planes at right angles thereto, the outer sides of each end flange being provided with radially extending ribs spaced apart about said axis for greater strength, the space between said ribs being empty for the conservation of material.

5. The combination of claim 1 in which said end flanges are formed of thermo-plastic material. 

